Hmmm . . .

I subscribe to a daily email quotation from the writings of Henri Nouwen. Earlier this morning I wrote a quick post called On Brokenness, quoting a couple of other bloggers on that theme, but if I had read my email I would have also included this from Nouwen:

Jesus was broken on the cross. He lived his suffering and death not as an evil to avoid at all costs, but as a mission to embrace. We too are broken. We live with broken bodies, broken hearts, broken minds or broken spirits. We suffer from broken relationships.

How can we live our brokenness? Jesus invites us to embrace our brokenness as he embraced the cross and live it as part of our mission. He asks us not to reject our brokenness as a curse from God that reminds us of our sinfulness but to accept it and put it under God's blessing for our purification and sanctification. Thus our brokenness can become a gateway to new life.